Title: The Case of Cupid's ArrowAuthor: Kat LeeFandom: Sherlock HolmesCharacter/Pairing: Holmes/WatsonRating: PG/K+Challenge/Prompt: holmes_minor January 2018 Monthly Prompt: RevelationsWarning(s): NoneWord Count: 400Date Written: 29 January 2018Summary: Disclaimer: All characters within belong to Doyle, not the author, and are used without permission.

He watches as the good doctor blusters. “Honestly, Holmes, that really was too close a call! Moriarty nearly killed me this time!” Watson pauses, his mustache twitching, and pushes his spectacles back up onto the bridge of his nose. His eyes narrow at the detective. “Aren’t you going to say something?!” he demands.

Sherlock continues to watch him for a good minute. Watson’s mustache begins to twitch again, and his mouth is just opening in another cry when Holmes speaks quietly, “I fear, my dearest friend, that to have lost you tonight would have left me akin to a bird struggling and utterly unable to leave the ground once its wings have been clipped.” He turns and walks away from him for that is already more than he should have said.

His mind flashes back as he moves away onto the moment tonight when Moriarty had had the pistols trained on Watson. Had he not managed to miraculously achieve the upper hand, Watson would now be dead, and he would be alone again. It never bothered him to be alone before. He made a vow along time ago to never allow the death the power to upset him. It was only a temporary nuisance after all, if all the greatest scholarly minds were to be believed. Still, somehow, the mere thought of being left alone without Watson’s companionship is something that still fills him with icy dread.

He slips alone into his study and shuts the door behind him. Leaning against the hard wood of the door, Holmes checks his pulse and his sweaty palms. He wipes at his brow as he removes his hat, walks over, and sinks into his chair. Looking into the embers of the crackling fire, he stares at what no one else can see, what he dares not admit aloud even now: the revelation that somehow Doctor Watson has come to mean much more to him than just the most cherished friend he’s ever had.

The impossible has happened at last. Somehow, he has thought with his heart instead of his mind. “Good Lord help us,” he whispers as he hears the floorboards creaking in the next room beneath the doctor’s feet. It’s impossible, but it’s happened nonetheless. He can deny it to the world, deny it to Watson still, but he can not deny it to himself: By Jove, he has fallen in love!